A Cowboy's Home (25 page)

“I won’t beg for something I don’t deserve,”
Jamie began. Then his bravery crumbled. “Because when I ran, when
he made me… I promised myself that when the moment came, when
someone tracked me down, I would try to be brave.” Tears spilled
out of his eyes and he furiously wiped them away. “But I’m not
brave.”

Adam had lived with an abusive parent. Too
often Justin saw Adam or Cole crying, until they just didn’t ever
cry again where their father was concerned. He saw that same
deadness in Jamie.

What would killing Jamie achieve? Would it
right the wrong that had been done to Justin? To Adam? One man had
raped them, another had burned them, yet another had thrown the
chemicals with evil glee on his face. And as for Jamie’s father, he
was like hell itself.

But Jamie? He’d been a kid, and whether he
thought he was brave or not, he was just standing here waiting to
die, and Justin felt something snap inside him. Yes, he’d held a
gun, but he’d never seemed evil. Just done what he was told.

Waiting for someone to kill him? It won’t be
me.

Justin looked left and right, then picked up
a pen and pulled a paper napkin close to him. He wrote some numbers
on the paper.

“This is my cell number. Call me one day.
Tell me how you’re not the bravest person I know to have survived
your father, and I’ll call you on your bullshit.”

Jamie looked down at the paper and back up at
Justin, his white-knuckled grip on the wood unmoving. “What?”
Justin turned to leave. “Wait!” Jamie called out. “I have to know.
I can’t live waiting for a day that you’ll come back to finish
this. Please. I want to… I have so much I want to do.”

Justin didn’t turn back to face him. “I won’t
be coming back. We’re done.”

“Don’t go.” Justin didn’t move. Waited for
whatever else Jamie had to say. “I’m sorry,” Jamie’s voice cracked
with emotion. “For what they did, for what I did. I can’t close my
eyes without seeing the agony, and the pain, and I want to say that
to your face. I thought of going to your family, but what could I
say… I need you to forgive me.”

Justin turned back to face Jamie. How could
he forgive Jamie, when he couldn’t even forgive himself? But Jamie
needed the words, and under the scrambled mess and chaos in his
brain, Justin found some small amount of compassion. “I forgive
you. I never blamed you,” he lied.

Jamie’s whole frame relaxed, and Justin left;
he hesitated outside the door of the coffee shop, looking across
the road at his car. For a second he was lost in what he’d just
done, then stuffed his hands in the pockets of his jeans.

Justin had found something in his heart
beside
the compassion he’d thought
gone forever.
Empathy
. The same ghosts that scared Justin
lived in Jamie. And on the heels of that, he knew he was done.

For real. Done.

He didn’t have to find someone who hurt him;
he didn’t have to make amends for him or Adam. He just needed to
hold on to compassion and empathy, and find himself. Talk to Adam,
help Adam to come to terms with lost memories, maybe even find some
peace for himself.

Maybe kiss Sam again.

Right now? Justin just wanted to go home.

Sam sat at the table nearest the kitchen, his
notebooks laid out in front of him and Gabe pacing from one end of
the restaurant to the other. Which, after all, wasn’t that far.
Ashley was composed and silent as she watched her fiancé walk past,
but a smile tilted her lips.

“Chocolate,” Gabe announced as he slid to a
stop on a turn. Then he frowned. “No… strawberry.”

Gabe took up the pacing again, and Sam
couldn’t help sighing loudly. “It’s cake, not a cure for cancer.
There is no wrong choice.

“Hush,” Ashley murmured, “this is funny. I’ve
never seen anyone so worked up before over one of my cakes.”

Sam elbowed her gently. “I still can’t
believe you’re making your own wedding cake.”

He ran a pencil down the list: salmon,
chicken, salads, champagne, the small wedding was no more than
forty people in the restaurant but it was being planned with
military precision.

Gabe stopped again. “Is fudge an option? With
the chocolate?”

Ashley took pity on him by standing and
stopping his latest turn around the restaurant. “How about a layer
of each?”

Gabe gripped her arms. “Really?” He said it
as though she’d saved the day. Then he scooped her up, kissed her
hard.

“That’s it, guys. It’s late—go to bed,” Sam
said with feigned disgust.

Laughing, Gabe pulled Ashley out of the
restaurant, with thanks and a wide grin, and Sam locked up after
them. He couldn’t help feeling a tiny bit lonely seeing all these
couples. Only because he’d experienced real attraction for the
first time in years and the man of his X-rated dreams had just
upped and left without a word.

Of course, it wasn’t just Sam who’d
experienced loss with Justin leaving like a thief in the night.
Ethan was hit the hardest; Adam was there for him, and Marcus was
trying his best but not quite coming up to scratch.

For a while, Gabe had said he wanted two best
men, Adam
and
Justin, and even suggested they should delay
the wedding until Justin came home. That soon changed, and Gabe
wasn’t the only one to think that Justin was gone for good. No one
actually held out hope that Justin was ever coming home again.

So that weekend, some four months after hope
had hit Sam hard, he’d given in and was going out with Nate and
Jay. Apparently they were getting him a boyfriend or at least a
friend with benefits because, as Nate put it, Sam was a miserable,
confused idiot. This Saturday, Sam was getting laid. Whatever.

He checked all the windows, an impulse left
over from a certain cat burglar who’d used the back window to get
in and finally switched off the interior lights. There were no
drapes at the windows, and moonlight from a cloudless sky glinted
on polished cutlery, all ready for the brunch guests tomorrow.

Pride spiked in Sam. He’d signed all the
paperwork last week, and Branches was now his baby; he owned a
little piece of Montana land, and it was home. His days off, he
still had his bike to disappear on, when the restless itch between
his shoulder blades meant he needed to travel, but in the main he
was happy.

He yawned when he reached the top of the
stairs, cracked his neck, and walked into the bathroom. He
showered, scrubbing away a day of catering, brushed his teeth, and
with a towel wrapped around his waist, walked into the moonlit
bedroom.

“Sam.”

“Fuck!” Sam yelped in surprise and then
stumbled back and straight into the wall. That was his name; spoken
softly—there was someone in his room.

Justin.

“Sorry,” Justin held up his hands. “Shit, I
didn’t mean to startle you.”

Sam pressed a hand to his chest. “Justin!
What the ever-living shit—”

“I just wanted to see you before I go up to
Dad’s house. Wanted to apologize and see—”

“Wait, what? You’re here, in my place, in my
bedroom? What do you mean ‘see’? See what? Are you home? Are you
hiding?” A horrible thought hit him. “Are you safe?”

Justin stepped closer, no more than two feet
away, and put his hands in the pockets of his jacket. “Sorry I
left.” He sounded sheepish.

Sam cleared his throat. “It’s okay. Everyone
expected it.”

Sue him for lying, but he wasn’t going to
single himself out as being disappointed, verging on disturbed,
when he’d woken up to find he was alone in the cabin.

“And, I wanted to thank you, because you
stroked my hair.”

Sam wasn’t entirely sure how to take that
one. “Sorry?”

“That is
mostly
what I remember, when I was ill. When I collapsed,
when they asked questions or judged me, you were there. So, thank
you.”

He turned to leave, heading for the window
with its ten-foot drop to the ground.

“You could use the door, you know,” Sam said,
following him to the window.

Justin looked at him, studied him as if he
was looking for something. Then, in a move so smooth that Sam had
no chance to react; Justin grabbed the back of his neck, drew him
closer, and pressed a kiss to his lips. Before Sam could kiss him
back or react in any way, Justin vaulted the window frame and then
slid to the ground. He landed like a freaking superhero, brushed
himself off, and without looking back walked away from Branches and
toward Marcus’s house.

Sam realized he was standing there with his
mouth open and his hands outstretched, reaching for Justin, with so
much dizzying lust flooding through him that he couldn’t stand.

He knew one thing: no way was he going
anywhere to get off with a stranger now, not if there was any
chance on this earth that he could do it with Justin.

And why was Justin back?

“I’ll ask him tomorrow. He has to put his
family first,” Sam whispered into the dark, with hope in his heart
for the first time in months.

But it wasn’t like Justin was playing easy to
get, or hell, even easy to find. Every time Sam spotted him, it
seemed Justin had a reason to walk the other way, or vanish into a
house, or hell, anything except stand with Sam. Clearly he was also
keeping his head down. Justin was here and that was just how it
was. There’d been no police visits, no arguments; everything was
very quiet.

Sam didn’t see anything of Justin the next
day, although his return was all anyone could talk about. To Sam’s
disgust, they all did it within his earshot.

Like Gabe, for example, telling Luke about
the fact Justin had explained how he could come home. “And then,
seriously, he just stood there and explained it all. Said he’d made
some kind of deal for his safety, and that’s it, he’s home.”

“Wow,” Luke said, “He’s here to stay, then?
He’s kind of cool.”

Gabe grinned at his little brother. “So he
says, and yeah, he is.”

And then it was Ashley, talking about how
happy Gabe was to have his other best friend home, how Gabe, Adam,
and Justin had talked on their back porch till some ungodly hour of
the morning.

“And so Gabe asked him,” she said as she
cleaned the nozzles on the coffee machine.

Sam was slicing the TCC slab cake for a group
of teens who’d been booked in with a local high school, and had
tuned
out the newest
Justin-is-back story. But Ashley was waiting for him to show
interest.

“Asked him what?” he asked. He’d clearly
tuned out way too much. He should go and find Justin and ask him
what the hell was going on, had that kiss meant anything, and was
it just Sam who was confused to the point of not knowing anything
at all.

“Are you even listening to me?” She teased
and smacked him on the ass with the wet dishrag. “Gabe asked Justin
to be his second best man, with Adam.”

Great. More Justin stories.

“Does that mean you need to adjust the
buttonhole order?” he asked.

Ashley paled. “Damn,” she said, “I hadn’t
thought about that. I need to phone the florist.”

And with that clever change in conversational
direction, he’d managed to get her talking about the wedding.
Score!
Sam refused to feel guilty, but he’d had his fill of
the prodigal son’s return. Because listening to other people
talking about Justin was just plain uncomfortable.

And leaving his bedroom window open in hopes
of Justin using it was giving Sam backache from the cold air that
woke him at 3:00 a.m. It ruined his sleep patterns.

Not to mention how awkward it was when three
days after coming home, just after lunch, the man himself came in
with the kids from the school. He’d been assigned the job of
teaching them how to pitch tents—or something equally outdoorsy
that Nate had explained at ass o’clock this morning and Sam had
tuned
out.

And damn it to hell, the asshole looked good:
jeans and a rolled-up scarlet cotton shirt that exposed his muscled
forearms and the fine hair that was so soft to touch. Anticipation
swelled inside Sam. Just maybe, Justin would smile at him, ask him
out, push him back against a wall and steal a kiss; anything that
meant touch would be involved or at least would give him hope that
it might happen later.

All the bastard did was smile at Sam as he
came over to collect the tray of soft drinks, and Sam was hard and
needy in seconds.
Pathetic.

“Hey,” Justin said, all innocently, as if he
had no idea that Sam was in some state of weird flux, if that was
even a word. “Can I get a coffee?”

“What kind?” Sam asked. And those two words
were a feat because up close, Justin was looking good, and Sam was
losing control of his faculties, including his ability to make
coffee.

“Cappuccino.”

Sam spoke before he fully engaged his brain.
“That’s a bit cutesy for you, isn’t it?

“What?” Justin frowned.

“Not strong black and straight up? Like a
real man?” Sam wished he’d never started this, he was edging toward
bitchy, and that was so not what he wanted, but his frustration was
showing.
Real man—what the fuck?

Justin smiled at him, but the smile didn’t
quite reach his eyes. “No, I like the cream,” he said.

Shit, and there it went, the most innocent of
comments, and Sam was a mess.

“Ashley, can you get a cappuccino for Justin?
I need to get out back.”

And he left, and yeah, he was being a dick,
but he was embarrassed and awkward and didn’t know where he stood.
So he ignored Justin’s frown and Ashley’s raised eyebrow, and went
and hid in the pantry.

At least the vegetables didn’t talk about
Justin.

Nate had tracked him down, Sam was in the
small office near the kitchen, working on menus, ordering, and
finances—all the back office work he normally hated.